Photography is an integral component of modern society, and photographs pervade our lives. Photographic images appear, for example, in books, magazines, catalogs, journals, newspapers, billboards, posters and scrapbooks and are displayed in homes, art galleries, retail stores, shopping malls, office buildings and many other places. While many photographic images are acquired using only natural ambient light, many other images are acquired using photographic flash lighting. When image-acquisition flash lighting is used, a photographer often uses one or more modeling lights prior to image acquisition for any of a variety of reasons, such as checking for unwanted shadows, glare, reflection, etc. and/or checking for desired shadows and other lighting effects. Generally, these modeling lights are either kept powered up to a sufficient level or turned up to a sufficient level when needed. Keeping the modeling lighting powered up can be problematic due to the heat this type of lighting generates, which can be uncomfortable for live models and detrimental to heat-sensitive still subjects. Occasionally turning up the power of modeling lighting can be inconvenient, even using more recent remotely-controlled modeling lights.
Many photographic images are acquired without adding special effects to the captured scene. However, many other photographic images are acquired using added special effects, such as artificial wind, snow, mist and rain, and/or using contrived scenes that use in-scene props and other items, such as in-scene lighting. Today, many special effects generators, for example, fans, snow shakers, misters and rain systems, are turned off and on electronically using dedicated on/off and/or speed/power control switches. Similarly, in-scene lighting can often be controlled using such dedicated control switches. Typically, a photographer, or more often a photographer's assistant, has the task of controlling the operation of any special effects devices and in-scene lighting for image acquisition.
In addition, some photographic settings, such as very low-light scenes photographed in a photography studio (or other location having controllable ambient lighting), require ambient lighting to be lowered or turned off during image acquisition so that the ambient light does not interfere with image acquisition. Often, this ambient lighting needs to remain on except for short periods at and around the time of image acquisition because the ambient lighting is necessary for the photographer and any assistants to see while moving around the studio and/or readying the scene for image acquisition. Usually, a photographer or photographer's assistant manually controls the pertinent ambient lighting device(s) using conventional dedicated controls.